DVD REVIEW: 
THE LIFE AND TIMES OF ALLEN GINSBERG
6/08/2013

Visionary, radical, spiritual seeker, renowned poet, founding member of a major literary movement, champion of human rights, Buddhist, political activist and teacher—Allen Ginsberg’s remarkable life shaped the very soul of American counterculture.

For 25 years, Academy Award®-nominated director Jerry Aronson accumulated more than 120 hours of film on Allen Ginsberg, resulting in this comprehensive portrait of one of America’s greatest poets, author of Howl and other groundbreaking poems. The DVD includes exclusive and revealing interviews with his friends, family and contemporaries as well as never-before-seen materials made public because of the warm friendship that developed between subject and director.

This compilation reveals the last 60 years of American culture beginning with the Beat era in the post-war Forties and Fifties, continuing through the revolutionary Sixties and concluding with the uncertainty and possibility of current times.


VIDEO:
Widescreen

AUDIO:
English 2.0 Dolby Digital Surround Sound

SPECIAL FEATURES:

Exclusive Interviews

Featurette: The Making of The Life and Times of Allen Ginsberg

Ginsberg reading selected poems

Bob Dylan and Allen Ginsberg at Jack Kerouac’s grave

William Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg at Naropa University

Neal Cassady and Allen Ginsberg at City Lights bookstore

The Making of the Music Video A Ballad of the Skeletons

Ginsberg guides us through an exhibition of his photographs

Excerpts from Scenes from Allen’s Last Three Days on Earth as a Spirit by Jonas Mekas

Ginsberg photo gallery

Director’s photo gallery

Memorial for Allen Ginsberg